Reckless
by Precarious
Summary: What if there was more to Hermione’s opinion of Sirius and his reckless behaviour during OotP than met the eye? SB/HG
1. Are they mistakes?

Summary: What if there was more to Hermione's opinion of Sirius and his reckless behaviour during OotP than met the eye?

Disclaimer: The Harry Potter World belongs to J.. I'm not making any money.

I feel guilty dropping hints about Sirius. Veiled as they are. But he is not right in the head after Azkaban. He's lonely and reckless and he has no concept of the consequences of his actions. You might say he can't be blamed for that. I would have tended to agree. Before I stayed there for the summer before my fifth year at Hogwarts started. At number 12 Grimmauld Place.

It started off inconspicuous enough. A few glances here and there. Looking at me even after I'd stopped speaking. Holding me hand a little longer than necessary if he would help me after I'd been cleaning. I didn't think anything of it. Nobody would, would they? I mean, he hasn't exactly got to have much contact with people on the run, and none for twelve years in Azkaban. I didn't notice that he didn't do it with anyone else. I thought nothing of smiling and talking to him. Of being alone in a room with him. Did I lead him on without realising? Was I naïve? He was Harry's Godfather. He is Harry's Godfather.

He told me I was pretty. It was about a week after I had arrived there for the summer, and I was telling him about when my teeth got cursed and I had to have them reduced, and how pleased I was not to be so ugly. He told me I could never be ugly. That I was a very pretty young witch and not to think such things ever again. I blushed. Everywhere felt hot. Perhaps I should have looked uncomfortable. Felt uncomfortable. Perhaps I did lead him on. But it's always nice to be told you are pretty. Especially of someone older, someone who was, I hear, quite the ladies man at Hogwarts. I was flattered. Who wouldn't be?

He looks down the table at me the next morning at breakfast and winks at me. I giggle. I try to suppress a wide grin. He holds open the door for me later on in the evening, and shows me into the Black Library. It's huge and so beautiful and there are so many books that I turn slowly around, my face beaming with delight and I turn and throw my arms around him in a hug. He goes tense for a few seconds and I think about withdrawing, perhaps I have over stepped the mark and we are not that close, but then I feel his arms around my back squeezing, and his face in my hair, and I instinctively snuggle closer, even though something in the back of my mind says this isn't quite right. It's too intimate and too private an embrace to be sharing with your best friend's Godfather.

I should have pulled away after a few seconds, but I didn't. I pressed myself closer to Sirius, and one of his hands ran down my bare arm, making me shiver slightly and the other slipped lower down my back so it was just above the top of my jeans. The buckle of his jeans is digging into my stomach and his breath is hot by my ear and my stomach is tingling, everywhere is tingling with something like excitement. My arms haven't moved, I'm too frightened to move them, I don't know what is happening and whether I should, and if I did where I would put them.

I let out a small sigh as his breath blows hot in my ear as he pulls his head back slightly, and I desperately hope he doesn't notice, which is a lie, I want him to notice, some part of me does anyway, and he does and his lips are just below my ear, ever such a tiny brush that he could claim was an accident should I pull away. I don't. I should. I should have. What am I doing?


	2. Darkness and Fire

A.N.: Thank you muchly for the reviews, : ) here's the next chapter.

A loud noise sounds from outside that we both recognise as Tonks knocking over the large serpent shaped lamp just down the hall. We spring apart, and this hits home to me that what we have just been doing, however slight, was not just an innocent hug. I blush and can't meet Sirius eyes, but even as I turn so as to look as if I am admiring the many books, I hear Tonks' footsteps going past the door to us and up the next flight of stairs. My insides squirm as I realise that we are again quite alone, but half of me hopes that Sirius will decide that this was a wakeup call and leave.

He doesn't. He's reckless. Trapped inside Grimmauld Place and devoid of all excitement and thrill. He has to watch everyone around him have adventures, and be taunted by Snape about his forced inactivity.

I feel Sirius behind me, one hand sweeping my hair out of the way, his lips gently brushing the same spot again. This time he can't pretend it's an accident. The thought panics me. I can't pretend to just be being affectionate if I turn around and look at him. If I don't make some announcement of my disgust and run from the room. But I am not disgusted. I should be. I wish I had been.

Sirius turns me and presses me to him with one hand on my back, the other on the side of my neck, tilting my head up so that I am forced to look at him. My eyes are wide but this doesn't seem to disturb him. He leans down and I can feel his hot breath on my lips. I feel hot panic rising slowly in my chest, making me feel slightly nauseas.

I finally do something with my arms and hands again, reaching up to place them on his chest, intending to push him away but he takes this as encouragement and before I can make it clear what I meant his lips are firmly on mine, pressing me backwards slightly so that I stumble, and the hand at the small of my back presses me to him more firmly, and I can feel a small moan creeping up out of my mouth and him smiling against my lips. The panic is like a fire raging in my chest now as I feel myself let Sirius' tongue into my mouth. Why aren't I stopping him and screaming and running away?

The dark smell of him suffocates me to him, and I'm starkly aware of how adult he is all of a sudden, not like Viktor or Ron. I feel dizzy as his hands start to roam slightly, one brushing my hip and up my side, the other down my arm as his lips move down to my neck and his teeth are grazing over my skin and I moan blatantly this time and there is no getting away from what I've done now. I can't pretend I didn't want him to, that I was in shock and then run away. A small voice keeps muttering darkly in the back of my mind that he won't stop now, now that I've started it. I've unleashed something dark he'd been hiding and it's my fault.

He lips travel lower and suck slightly at the skin around my collar bone, and my hand acts of its own accord, thrusting itself deep into his thick black hair, my fingers curling around it and my throat emitting noises I didn't know I was capable of. His dark grey eyes are on me, I can feel them burning my skin and I'm finally able to look at him, and electric sparks all over my body as his eyes burn with something I don't fully understand. I gasp as he kisses me this time, the passion in the way he presses me urgently to him, his hands all over my back and in my hair all at the same time, crushing my body and my mouth to him, heat flooding me till I feel as if I have caught fire. He pulls away suddenly and grabs my hand leading me deeper into his library.

My legs feel like they are made of jelly and belong to someone else as I move ghost like behind him, as he pulls me far out of sight of the door, and the panic is back, simmering away in my stomach, thoughts of what his leading me wherever it is that he is leading me means.


	3. Questions

A.N.: Thank you so much for the reviews : ) they've made my morning : ). On to the next chapter.

Thoughts of what I've done by allowing this to continue, are knocked from me along with my breath as I feel my back slam into a heavy oak book case in amongst a labyrinth, and Sirius mouth is on mine again, and his hands are making their way under my top, my stomach tensing as his hot hands brush over it and skim the bottom of my bra. I instinctively press my lower half closer to him and his belt buckle is digging into me again and so is something else as his hands leave my top to grab my hands and hold them to the bookcase above my head, his tongue delving hard into my mouth and a low growl emitting from deep within his throat when I let out another moan. His hard chest is pressing against me, and I feel dizzy again at the not unpleasant crushing sensation overwhelms me and I think again that I should stop this now before I can't and I think again that It might already be too late. Panic is pounding in my chest again, along with something else I don't fully recognise, and I feel suffocated as Sirius trails hot kisses down my neck, his hands going down to my bottom to pull me against him more firmly.

The hilarity of Harry's Godfather touching my bum in Order headquarters rises up a strangled laugh that I try to squash, my breathing becoming even shallower, and I begin to feel dizzy as his hands move round to my front, reaching up and lifting the bottom of my top slightly, I can feel him hesitate and now's my chance, to say something, push him away, run if I have to and put a stop to this. I don't feel myself and I don't like it, I want to be back upstairs with the others, talking to Ginny and killing doxies, not with Sirius and his hands everywhere and my clothes starting to disappear.

Perhaps someone is looking down on me. And the second it happens a massive wave of both relief and disappointment roll over me, as Sirius' hands instantly drop my top, his lips pull away from mine and he jumps backwards as if burnt. Harry is in the library, calling my name, and Sirius', announcing that dinners ready and that he's been looking for us and why does he have to be here, why do we have to have dinner when I could be here, pressed against Sirius and I see him half move towards me, to do what I don't know. Cover my mouth? Pull me further into a labyrinth of books, a final kiss? But he stops, and stares at me deep in the eyes, more and more of the Sirius Harry knows pouring back into his eyes, and he looks worried. That I might tell someone? That he's gone too far? Has he?

"We're here. Just showing Hermione the family library."

It's the first thing I've heard Sirius say since we entered the room and it startles me. Was I dreaming? Some jinx from a book belonging to Sirius' Mother? But of course he would lie. He's not going to announce to his Godson that he's just been feeling up his underage best friend.

But everything he does seems to announce it at dinner that evening. The way he glances at me across the table. The small wink he gave me as Molly mentioned cleaning the Black Library. The smirk that crossed his face as I blushed scarlet. My insides felt hot; guilt, lust and angst churning around together.

Would he do it again? Would he take my non-refusal as continual consent? Was this how it would be now, some secret twisted affair with Harry's Godfather, the guilt of which pouring over ever thing else like liquid fire? I felt as if my face was bellowing out to people what I had done, what I had allowed to happen.

I'm lying in bed, my heart thundering in my ears, wondering whether he'll do anything else. Maybe he'll just forget about it, but I know even as the thought comes into my head that it's silly. The way his hand brushed my knee under the table and the dark look he gave me told me that he had every intention of continuing what Harry had interrupted. Panic is eating away at me, and I again feel nauseas, and I feel as if I really am going to be sick when I hear creaking, convinced that it's my bedroom door and Sirius has come to rape me. Would it be rape? I have no idea. It would be. I don't want my first time to be like that. Do I? Would I rather have a gentle, romantic drawn out occaision with a boyfriend my age? Or would I sooner have my skin feel like white fire as Sirius touched me, my heart to be pounding every second with fear that it would both stop and continue? Would he force me? A question like that a few days ago would have been met with a thousand exclamations of denial, but now not so confident. I have no reason to think he would. I did nothing to try and stop him when we were together earlier. But something in his eyes was so dark, and... I fall into a restless sleep, waking up to every small house noise, but awake in the morning, undisturbed.

A rush of disappoint flies at me as I realise he didn't come. Any ridiculous notions I had of rape vanish as I feel a hot blush burn my face. How arrogant I was to think he'd want to continue. Of course I did something wrong, and he was only too glad when Harry came and interrupted and he didn't have to pretend that he wanted me. Embarrassment eats at me as I shower and get dressed, pleased as it is only 5.30am and no one else will be up. I trudge my way down to the kitchen, feeling quite miserable and unwanted, only to find Sirius sat at the table, a glass of something amber in his hand, glaring at the marked table top.

"Oh... I didn't think anyone else would be up. Do you want me to..." I trail off as Sirius gaze bores into me, his eyes raking up and down me. I feel angry as I realise what he's drinking by the smell, and embarrassed that its drink that makes him look at me like that. I turn to leave.

"Come here." His voice is gravely, and I turn but don't make any move towards him.

"You're drunk. I'm going back to bed." I glare at him, angry that at his rejection of me in the night, angry that he's drunk and angry that he ever touched me in the first place. Angry that he can make me feel a million things at once, and that all of them make my stomach ache.

He rolls his eyes, points his wand at his head and mutters something, and stands up.

"Better?" His voice is clear and serious now. He's moving towards me, and stops a foot away, staring down at me, daring me to say no and leave. I don't. Why am I letting this happen again?


	4. Luck

A.N.: Next chapter up! Spurred on by the reviews , thank you .

"_Better?" His voice is clear and serious now. He's moving towards me, and stops a foot away, staring down at me, daring me to say no and leave. I don't. Why am I letting this happen again?_

Because the feel of his eyes burning into mine made my legs feel as if they were going to give way beneath me, because the way he towered over me intimidated me and excited me at the same time, because when he hadn't come into my room last night I ached and dreamt of his hot hands all over me, and the fire in my stomach burned so much I wanted to scream. Because I shouldn't let it happen again. But I was going to.

I nod faintly. I bite my lip and my fingers twitch slightly towards him. Sirius takes this as consent and is kissing me immediately, backing me up into the door and pressing me to it tightly, his lips bruising and crushing. I gasp with both pleasure and shock at the realisation of what I've done, again. I don't fully understand why I am reaching up and encircling him with my arms, one in his hair, pulling him still closer to me, mumbling his name and he's lifting up my top, and I'm helping him, lifting up my arms even as I'm telling myself that this is insane, that he's much too old and we're far too close to the others getting up and It's too risky and no-one that counts has ever seen me topless before.

He's kneeling, kissing my belly and making me shiver, looking up at me and grinning, his grey eyes glinting in the warm candle light. His kisses trail upwards and his hands are slipping the straps of my underwear over my shoulders and part way down my arms and the tingling is more of a burning now as I tug at his hair to get him to kiss me, pressing myself into him and I hear a throaty moan and it takes a few moments to realise that it's me.

I feel him smirk, rubbing himself against me through his jeans, one hand over my bra and one in my hair, and then he's taking his shirt off and I gasp at the feel of his hot skin against mine, and I trace the tattoos and scars from Azkaban and he tries to brush my hand away, but I carry on, and he moans and we're kissing again with his arms either side of me, trapping me against him and then one has trailed down and is brushing down my arm and his teeth are at my neck and then his hand reaches the top of my jeans and is undoing the top button and panic is swooping down on me, swallowing me and I can feel my breathing get shallower and Sirius is taking this as encouragement when really I'm not so sure I do want this white fire that's consuming me, it's making me feel sick it burns so much and what if someone did find us and he's pulling now at my jeans tugging them downwards and I say his name, but he doesn't realise what I mean and why should he, and I can't bring myself to stop him or carry on. But I don't have to force a decision out of myself, because as Sirius reaches for the belt buckle of his own trousers he glances sideways to the large silver clock on the wall and pulls back, staring at me wide eyed. He mutters an assortment of swearwords as he steps forward to me, kissing me desperatly as he does the button back up on my jeans, then leans down and hands me my top. For once my feelings are unconfused as I tidy myself up to the noises of footsteps above us. The cool wave of relief washing over me is fantastic, and I can't help but grin. Sirius mistakes this and grins back at me, winking as he straightens my top.

But even as I'm consumed with relief at the interuption by the impending day, I'm hoping that I get another chance to kiss Sirius. I push thoughts of where that will lead away.

I'm foolishly deluded by the luck I have had so far. How could I have thought I could avoid the conclusion forever? But luck breeds arrogance, and so it did in me.


	5. Security

A.N.: Two chapters in one day! Thanks for the reviews once again, they've made me a very happy bunny :).

_But luck breeds arrogance, and so it did in me._

I learned this lesson less than 3 days later. In those few short days we hardly saw each other. The few stolen moments we had in between cleaning and collapsing exhausted into bed were filled with hot desperate kisses, that seemed to become increasingly so the longer it went without more happening. Sirius would press me into an alcove, his whole body against mine, kissing me until I was breathless and touching me everywhere he could till someone's footfalls could be heard or one of our names were called.

I spent the entire time excited, wondering when he would next whisper in my ear for me to meet him on my way upstairs to help Mrs Weasley, or catch my arm as I was about to go into the bathroom and kiss my neck and whisper something low in my ear that would make my face go hot and my eyes dart around to check no one had heard. I found myself showering twice a day, whether this was for Sirius' benefit or to attempt to wash off the dirty feeling that crept up on me when I was with Harry and Ron, I don't know.

I felt both flattered and worried by Sirius' public attention. He would wink at me down the dinner table sometimes, and I would giggle but then immediately look around, checking that no one had seen. I was convinced that they would instantly know what we had been doing, they would see the stolen moments we had shared all over the house, the way his hands would burn my skin as they touched me, written across my face plain as day. He would take any opportunity to touch me, helping me down from ladders and boxes whilst I was cleaning with the others, his hands lingering just a little too long on my hips, or my hand, or my back as he guided me through a door. I was consumed with terror that Harry would see, or almost worse Ron because he would blurt it out, and then Harry would know anyway and so would everyone else.

I felt terrible for what I was doing to Harry. I was supposed to be his best friend, and here I was putting his and Sirius' relationship in jeopardy and Sirius' safety and place in the Order. The thought of what Mrs Weasley would do to Sirius should she find out, when she already thinks he's round the twist and an irresponsible Godfather. And for what, a few steamy kisses with an older man? But I couldn't stop, no matter how many I times I told myself I should. Even if I had tried, I don't know whether Sirius would have let it drop by that point. I had lead him on too far, and he had the look of a caged animal whenever he would have to be with me in company. I could his feel his eyes raking over me; burning my skin as he eyed me hungrily as soon as the others attention was diverted. But as soon as I registered this dark look in his eyes, I dismissed it, along with the tremor of fear I felt in my guts, and I squashed the instinct that told me I should stop this now rather than later. That I might not have the option to stop it later.

I told myself that I was judging him too harshly. And that I was being arrogant. This is Sirius, Harry's Godfather. He would never do anything like that. He's good guy. Loyal and brave. He's in the Order for Merlin's sakes. And was I so vain to think that he wouldn't be able to contain his lust for me and force me? How absurd I thought I was. I was embarrassed that any such thought had crossed my mind.

But the world is not split into good people and Death Eaters as Sirius would tell me later. But it is also not split into bad people and Order members.


	6. Windows

The house is unbearably hot. The air is hot and sticky and I feel as if I am being slowly smothered, which is the rather feeble, but none the less true reason Sirius has used to end up in my room at one o'clock in the morning. He's just finished casting a cooling charm on the room as he turns to look at me, standing awkwardly by my bed.

His eyes are dark and the hungry look in his eyes is back, but mixed with something else I can't decipher. He moves over to me slowly at first, but quickly surrounds me with his arms and kisses me deeply, bruisingly till I can't breathe and I struggle slightly. He lets me go swiftly, and I am pleasantly surprised to see him looking at me sheepishly.

"Sorry love. I just er. Well I missed you I suppose." He looks at me unsurely after he says this. We have never actually spoken about what is going on between us. In fact the only verbal communication we have had that's in any way out o the ordinary is him asking me to meet him or the blush inducing things he will whisper in my ear on occasion. His statement both startles me and makes me smile, my insides going pleasantly warm, quite a different sensation from the intense burning of a million emotions I have been used to feeling.

I continue to smile shyly as I say that I've missed him too, despite the fact that I have enjoyed the security of our time limited liaisons. It is nice to be alone with him. I move back towards him and brush a wave of hair out of his face, and this too startles me. It seems ridicilus to say, but this seems starkly intimate in comparison to the other times I have touched him. I blush slightly as Sirius raises his eyebrows. His grey eyes sparkle as he tells me how beautiful I look in my pyjamas and I laugh softly, pushing his arm slightly and he pushes back, and I'm falling onto the bed and he's on top of me, and perhaps it wouldn't be so bad after all, this thing I have been dreading. The feel of him on top of me, laughing and pinning my arms playfully makes my stomach and heart flutter happily. This is a Sirius I am not frightened of somewhere in the back of my mind, and it is intensely comforting to feel at ease. I have the odd sensation that I am gazing through a window into the past. That if I had been around before Azkaban, this is the Sirius I would have met. Laughing and playful and no desperation in his eyes. I lean up to kiss him and it is hot and passionate and frightening, but in a much different way this time.

I am frightened because I am no longer so certain that this gargantuan event I have been dreading is something I should be dreading. Perhaps things won't happen as I fear they will. Perhaps I will want them too.

I kiss run my hands up and down Sirius' back and I lift my hips up to bump into his.

I don't want a convenient interruption. I want whatever it is that happens to happen. Whatever I might look back on this night and think, I wanted Sirius Black.


	7. A Defence

_**It is a curious thing, how our perception of events can change so wildly from day to day, despite the event remaining totally unchanged. Sometimes I look back on our first night together and I feel angry, and disappointed in the Sirius I know allowing things to go that far with an underage witch who's feelings about their relationship changed with every breath. That he should have known better, he was an adult, he was Harry's Godfather, he should have placed the potential damage our affair would do to Harry as his top priority, not the things he could do in the dark of night with me. It frustrates me that someone so loyal and brave and inherently good, could do something so wrong. This is what has always so deeply annoyed me about Sirius. His recklessness, his total and utter irresponsibility as soon as an exciting and risky adventure rears its head. His complete and utter disregard for the consequences. **_

_**But then the next day I will find these same qualities alluring, perhaps because I lack them, perhaps because they have always been associated with attractiveness, the bad boy, the rebel. I will long for the excitement of being dragged into a broom closet or a disused drawing room. To be pressed against a wall and kissed beyond all sense, on the other side of which stand my closest friends and respected Order members seems thrilling. **_

_**And on another I will defend all of his actions. He had, after all, spent twelve years in the foulest prison on earth. Not only did he suffer the most excruciating tortures, he had twenty-four hour Dementors. How does a person cope with that? Left alone to live your life in peace you would drive yourself half mad knowing that the entire Wizarding World believes you have committed terrible crimes; killed thirteen people, worked for the most evil man that ever lived and betrayed your best friends and their new born child. Imagine trying to retain some vestige of sanity despite all of those things, whilst having every happy thought sucked out of you, the threat of the dementor's kiss always hovering over you like a knife.**_

_**Of course he was lonely and wanted comfort of that sort. He won't have been touched in 12 years in that place, and the opportunity for sex or anything else whilst on the run from both the Wizarding and the Muggle world, will have been somewhat sparse. He was a grown man. A man who had once been popular and fawned over by girls. A man who was not used to being alone, and who had not been used to being told what to do. **_

_**Not to mention that it is a scientific fact that the part of the brain that considers and weighs consequences properly usually only develops fully in men during their twenties. I would imagine that all emotional development comes to an abrupt halt in Azkaban. **_

_**Is it any wonder, I tell myself, that he seized the opportunity to feel wanted and have comfort and some excitement in his life, and disregard that I was not quite of age? **_

_**This is the argument I most often find myself recounting in my head, as if I must defend him from myself. **_

_**Perhaps because I know, deep down, that it probably was not right to take a 15 year olds virginity when you had no hope of sustaining a relationship with her, whether you wanted to or not. **_

_**But, rightly or wrongly, that is what Sirius did. What I did. **_


	8. Stealing My Soul

A.N.: I meant to say in the last update, thank you very much for the reviews : D. Once again they have me up typing into the wee hours.

I stir in bed, attempting to turn over and look at the clock when I discover a heavy arm across me. It's lean but strong looking and it has black hair. I twist as much as I can, and as I see Sirius sleeping face, and his hair falling into his eyes, a rush of images flies at me so fast that I feel as if I am being pinned back into the bed.

Sirius on top of me, his laughter dying in his throat as our hips meet, hair falling in his eyes as he kisses my neck and legs and I hurt and I can hear gasping and it's mine, and the voice whispering my name, like gravel and music at the same time, into my ear is Sirius' and the 'maybe we shouldn't' is definitely mine, and then it's not a jumble of images, I can remember everything and my face flushes scarlet.

Sirius' fingers at the top of my underwear, his eyes searching my face briefly until my hips hesitantly lift up, and the way he told me I was the most beautiful girl he had ever seen, and that for the first time I felt as if I believed him, and that I wanted him and I wanted him more than I was worried about what he'd think of me and whether I would do everything properly. I felt like a different person and it was wildly exciting, kissing each other in the semi-darkness, his bare chest pressed against mine, his hands everywhere, making my back arch up off the bed and noises I didn't know I could make falling from my lips before I could stop them. Then his bare legs were entangled with mine and he had his arms around me and the kisses are like fire, the flames building in intensity until I feel as if I will explode. And then he is doing what I was dreading for what seemed like an eternity, and I say that maybe we shouldn't, and again to the surprise of the cynical little voice at the back of my head that told me he wouldn't stop, he did, and he looked at me, and he asked me if I wanted to. I know what he is saying, do I want to, not should we, or what would everyone else think or is this how it is supposed to be. And at that moment I do, and I'm so sick of having to be sensible, I want to do what I want.

And I hurt and it really hurts but he keeps kissing me which keeps me from crying too much and then it's okay and it seems to last forever and I'm sore and I kind of just want it to stop now, but I would feel rude to say anything, and then it's over and he's apologising and I don't understand why. He looks embarrassed and I snuggle into him, and we're kissing again and he's doing things that make my heart pound and my fingers twist and dig into the pillows above me till I am sure their stuffing will be everywhere.

And now I'm here. In bed with Sirius Black, with the quite possibly the biggest smile I have ever worn plastered across my face.


	9. Guilt isn't enough

A.N.: Hi folks. Sorry it's been longer between updates this time, I've been working all weekend. I'll hopefully get another chapter up tonight or tomorrow morning. Thank you all very much for the reviews, they've been a really treat to come into.

I wonder briefly if I am making a terrible mistake, continuing this affair with Sirius. If I am setting myself up for certain heartbreak.

But when I think about it not continuing it, my stomach clenches painfully and I feel slightly sick. The panic that I once felt at kissing Sirius swoops down on me once more, and my heart feels pinched.

We don't get the chance to see each other much again for a few days, and the lack of contact makes me feel quite moody and teary. I feel as if my heart will burst when Sirius finally takes my hand as I trudge up a corridor, pulling me into his room, and pressing me against the door as soon as it's closed. His eyes are warm and not quite so desperate, and for a moment I wonder if this means he's gotten what he wanted and he's going to let me down gently now, but then his lips are on mine and I can't think, and the hands creeping under my clothes make my knees feel weak, and I wonder if I will faint with the relief of being close to him again. I kiss him back so eagerly he laughs, and I blush and try to pull away but he grabs me, and tells me he's missed me too. His eyes bore into mine, searching them for something, and I feel giddy as I stare wide eyed back up at him.

He misses me. Me. I grin, and run my hands through his hair, but then there is Mrs Weasley shouting me, and for a second I curse her, and I tell Sirius to ignore her but she keeps shouting up and he groans and lets me go, whispering to make sure I'm alone at midnight, and I shiver.

I slouch moodily into the kitchen and bite savagely into a sandwich, glaring at the table. I don't feel myself at all, and it frightens me. I'm not like this. This person that's glaring at Mrs Weasley's back is not me, and I wonder if Sirius moodiness is rubbing off on me. I start to think about what would have happened if Sirius and I hadn't been interrupted, and I'm just imagining the feel of his hot breath against my neck when Harry starts talking to me, and it's like he flicks a switch and I'm myself again, and I cast a guilty look at Mrs Weasley, and throw myself into the conversation with Harry.

As we talk I try desperately not to think about midnight, that in a few short but still too long hours I'll be kissing his Godfather, pressing myself up into him and doing things that should he know about them I feel sure he wouldn't be talking about how great it is to see Sirius, and my stomach twists horribly as guilt crashes on me even as I try to block the thought, but then I remember the way Sirius had touched me after we had sex last night, and how his teeth had grazed my skin and I don't feel quite so guilty as I glance up the table at Sirius, to find he's looking at me too and I flush as he winks at me and I turn to Harry, praying he hasn't noticed which of course he hasn't.

It's midnight and I feel so nervous I am sure I will be sick. The hours have passed agonizingly slow, but as soon as midnight was within reach and my nerves began attacking me the minute hand seemed to speed up manically and I found myself wishing that it would slow down and give me more time.

I've spent an hour deciding what pyjamas to wear, how to have my hair, whether I should be wearing make up, whether I'll look too tarty or too plain or- and he's coming through the door and it doesn't matter, not when he looks at me like that.


	10. A reason

I wish I had realised then how much Sirius meant to me. It is a very cruel truth that we often do not realise how much someone means to us until they are about to be snatched away, and then the awful truth that the thought of living without them is so horrific that you want to be snatched away too crashes down on you like so much icy water and you can't breath, and then they are gone and your world has collapsed. Your watching Harry try to go after him and you just can't breath for tears and the waves of pain rising up in your chest makes you feel as if you will certainly choke.

I obviously realised that I cared for him a great deal. We were having an affair for a year, though obviously it was virtually impossible to maintain contact whilst I was at Hogwarts, thanks to that vile Umbridge. How I hated her for keeping me from talking to him, There were times when my temper would flare and I would beat and tear at my pillow, thinking that I hated her more than I had ever hated anyone. How that feeling is magnified now, when I think of the months I could have had with Sirius stolen from me. I could have spoken to him, perhaps if I had dared I could have even sneaked to see him a few times. I hate her. I hate her. I hate the fact I am still here.

It wasn't so bad during the war. I had a purpose. I had to help Harry. I had to protect him. For me and for Sirius. He would have hated me if I had deserted him. I don't know if I believe in Heaven, but the thought that there was a chance that I could be reunited with Sirius was compelling. However I knew that he would not be waiting for me if I abandoned Harry. Perhaps he would not be waiting for me at all. But when I remembered the way he would look at me as he would press me to him, I knew there was at least a chance that he would be. And that was definitely a chance worth fighting for.

That is not to say that if that had not been a factor I wouldn't have bothered. I wanted to fight. I wanted to win. Perhaps as much if not more than I wanted to see Sirius again. To kiss him. To do all the things I had taken for granted. I wanted Harry to win. I wanted us all to win. I was not going to die in a world where Voldemort still breathed.

But after the war I was left without a purpose. The comfort I had sought in Ron's arms upset me as much as it warmed me, and I would cry at night after we had kissed. I loved him. I might have been in love with him. But I belonged to Sirius. And I was going to do everything in my power to get him back. To rescue him from behind that damned Veil. I was going to earn the title of best witch of the age that Harry kept insisting on bandying about. I had to.


	11. Mistletoe

As I help everyone decorate the kitchen ready for Christmas Day , I feel my heart bounce as Sirius helps me down from a ladder, his hand lingering too long on mine and I can't possibly suppress a grin, but it's Christmas so I can get away with it.

Which I believe is also my excuse, that after a few covert tastes of Sirius' glass of fire whiskey when we are sat in one of the more comfier drawing rooms, that I kiss Sirius in front of Harry.

There's mistletoe dotted around the house thanks I suspect to the Weasley twins, that vanishes and reappears in different spots so that it is impossible to avoid. We're both walking back to our chairs after getting a drink when Tonks, somewhat drunkenly I do suspect, calls out that there's mistletoe. Sirius and I look at each other, and the twins start a chant of 'kiss, kiss, kiss' whilst stamping their feet. Harry is laughing at my deer in headlights expression, and Ron is glowering at the stunned gnome atop the Christmas tree. I think that it will look better for Sirius if I kiss him, and he is less likely to get a lecture from Molly, and I'm just turning slightly to kiss him swiftly on the lips (Tonks had tried to avoid kissing Fred earlier by giving him a peck on the cheek, at which point the mistletoe had started firing dung bombs at her). But then I feel his hand on my arm and his lips brushing against mine, and I feel the restraint it takes not kiss me properly in the strength of his grip on my right arm.

Harry's eyes are wide and I'm blushing and Sirius is laughing and sitting down with Remus and Tonks is clapping and then Harry laughs only to receive a glare from Ron and I hear him mutter something but I don't really care right now.

I feel daring and happy and anxious to have done it, but I feel as if a weight has been lifted of my chest. Even though it was just a kiss under the mistletoe, Harry did not do any of the things I had wildly imagined he would. Of course he didn't. It's Sirius.

I curl up by the fire and Sirius winks at me and laughs, and I get a rather vivid flashback to the way he had laughed at my blushing face after we had slept together last night. I'd been rather er… vocally enthusiastic towards the end, and he'd winked at me and said that it was always the quiet ones that turned out to be the dirtiest.

We no longer go days between spending time alone, as once of us will create a situation if one does not present itself. Sirius furiously kissing me in a broom cupboard of the second floor hall has so far been all we've managed today what with Christmas preparations, but the excitement of his hands pinning my wrists above my head as he kissed his way hotly down my neck, has been enough to sustain me until now, as he is quietly coming through my bedroom door, grinning at me, and pushing me down onto the bed.


	12. A fresh kind of panic

The thought of the hour we spent last night together before Ginny knocked on my door and Sirius had to swiftly apparate back to his bedroom whilst I hastily dressed has left me feeling hot and flustered all day. But despite the fact we were interrupted I can't keep the inexplicable smile from beaming across my face every time I think of Sirius. I can still feel his hands moving up my sides as he slid my nightshirt off me, kissing me and wrapping my legs around his back and the way he moaned my name in my ear as he did things to me that I never once imagined I would be doing a few weeks ago, especially with Sirius. The feel of his broad shoulders under my hands and the heat of his breath against me as he trailed hot sucking kisses down my chest make my stomach ache desperately.

I still feel confused when Sirius looks at me. It is as if he is eating me up with his gaze, incase he should never see me again. Of course, this may have something to do with my impending departure to Hogwarts, but the thought of that makes me want to cry and scream and be sick and yet I long for Hogwarts, it's my home. I have to force the thought from my mind and focus on Sirius or the swooping feeling of despair consumes me and I find myself crying as Sirius kisses me later on in the library, and he asks me what's wrong and I can't find the words to tell him, I just press myself closer to him and he seems to understand, and he buries his face in my hair and I can feel his heart hammering against me, and I wonder if he will miss me too.

I often wonder about the strength of Sirius' feelings for me, but I would never dare ask, the courage needed for that is not something I readily possess, and I find myself thinking that I would rather be cornered by that Troll in the girls bathroom again than have to look Sirius in the eye and ask him how much he likes me. I wonder late at night when Sirius has fallen asleep beside me (which always strikes me as insanely risky but I never have the heart to force the issue when he shushes me and says he prefers not sleeping alone) whether he will still talk to me after I have left for Hogwarts, or whether it is just sex this relationship that we are having. Is it a relationship? An affair? Or is he just sex starved after Azkaban? But even as I think that I see the hungry way in which he looks at me, and it is not just a look of a man who hasn't been with a girl for over a decade. There is something else there and I don't know what it is. I know what I hope it is. Wouldn't anyone hope that?

Which I can't help but feel is selfish as I don't even know how I feel about Sirius myself. On the one hand the thought of him makes me feel hot everywhere, my insides fill with a warm liquid akin to butterbeer, and I keep grinning for no reason. But on the other hand, my more sensible side warns me that there can't possibly be a future in an affair with Harry's on the run Godfather, who the majority of the Wizarding World believe to be Voldemort's right hand man, a mass murderer and a lunatic. Perhaps they are right on the lunatic count. Who else would start a relationship (Is that what this is?) with his Godson's fifteen year old friend, right under the noses of the entire Order of the Phoenix? Under Mrs Weasley's nose?

But I would be lying through my teeth if I said that I was not glad that he had. If I said I wished we had not had that chance embrace in the Library. If I said that I never wanted to feel his hands spreading white fire across my skin. The thought of never feeling Sirius Black, escaped convict and my best friends Godfather, pressed against me in the middle of the night, fills me with a panic a like of which I have never experienced, not even in the tentative first days of whatever this is that we are embarking on.


	13. Cancer

A.N.: Thank you all so much for the reviews : D. To answer one of the reviews, by 'MR' - Chapter ten was a kind of 'flash-forward' as is this one.

I have asked Harry if I may stay at Grimmauld Place. It is a mistake I know, and a complete diversion from what I know I should do. It is emotional suicide, going back to somewhere where I am sure the onslaught of memories will crash upon me until I am crushed. And yet I cannot stop myself from asking, from packing my things and preparing to move. He seems to find it an odd request, unsurprisingly, but I tell him that I am working on something important and that I need to be out of the way. I do not want reporters able to find me and question me on the final battle; I don't want anyone checking on me, I need to be alone so that I can work. I need Sirius' library.

I feel strangely let down by Hogwarts library, and the many others I have exhaustively searched. I feel as if they have pushed me to this, by not yielding the information that I need. They have pushed me into the arms of darkness, for I feel sure that the Black library will be full of strange and dark magic, but I feel as if I do not at least look, I will have let us all down. Harry does not know of course, I feel that he would be concerned with what he would perceive a highly odd obsession with his Godfather. If he was able to move on, then why wasn't I? After all, my only real connection to Sirius was Harry, and as far as he was concerned I had found him reckless and somewhat round the twist.

I wonder briefly whether Sirius would approve of me delving into his family's library, if he would sooner not be brought back that way. A niggling voice that I am sure is accurate tells me that he would not want anything to do with his family to be involved him bringing him back, that he would not want me to soil my soul with dark magic, that he would sooner be dead than be tainted himself by something so foul. But I am much too selfish, and much too round the twist myself to pay too much attention to my voice of reason.

I do not feel myself, as I did not when Sirius and I were first together, but now it is not a pleasant change, and I long for the feel of Sirius more than anything else and it is consuming, knawing away at me like a cancer the thought that I might be able to bring him back, if I work just a little bit harder, do just a little bit more research. I cannot recollect the last time I had more than 3 straight hours of sleep, and it is with slight irony that I realise I probably slept more when we were tracking down horcruxes and battling for the salvation of the Wizarding World. I'm just fighting for one person this time, but it is by far more exhausting.

It is with a growing manic excitement that I pour through books in the library where we first kissed, and the pain that rips through my heart when I think that I might never kiss him again, make my chest and heart clamp inwards tightly, and I feel as if I cannot breathe. These breakdowns continue to hinder my research, and I wonder if I did the right thing taking up residence here, but the painful comfort I can seek at night, curling into Sirius' bed, slowly restoring his room to how it had been before it had been so violently searched, gazing until my eyes burn at the picture of him with the other Marauders and I fall into a fitful disturbed sleep is not something I can now give up, and the thought of returning to my small cottage in Hogsmead makes me cry too, and I'm beginning to suspect that there is not much these days that does not.


	14. I am

A.N.: The bold at the end highlights one of those pesky flash-forward moments. Thank you so much for the reviews and encouragement  I'm glad you still like the story.

I'm in Sirius' bed for the first time. The thought is oddly thrilling, considering that we have slept together a good few times now, but it has never been in his room, in his bed. I snuggle deeper into the blankets, wanting to inhale all of his scent up and store it for a later date, but I hear Sirius stirring so I settle for casually breathing it. I giggle as he sleepily blinks at me, and momentarily looks shocked and then a rather sexy smile forms on his lips, and his eyes rake over what he can see of me, and he kisses me softly.

I feel my heart skip strangely at this odd contact. There has been nothing soft or slow about any of Sirius' kisses. They have been rough and fiery, and have always set my skin ablaze. It is as if Sirius thinks the same, because he suddenly looks embarrassed and quickly replaces the small smile that had been playing across his features with a smirk, and he peeks under the cover at my rather lacking in clothes form. I blush furiously and swat his hand away from the covers, giggling and he's on top of me holding my hands down into the pillows above me, and he's laughing as I make rather futile attempts to struggle free. Then he's an inch away from my lips and all thoughts of softness are gone, I want fire and so many other things and my stomach is filled with lava it seems as I press my hips up into his and he's kissing me, and it is with a new kind of desperation that isn't frightening.

It makes my heart hurt and pound wildly and my stomach swirl, but I don't know what this is, this way in which he is kissing me, as if I might disappear at any second, and I find myself kissing him back in the same way, and I'm distantly aware that I'm crying, and I can feel Hogwarts getting closer and I feel as if I will be sick. And for one moment that is so uncharacteristic of myself that I wonder if I have gone quite mad, I did not want to return to Hogwarts, so badly in fact that I wished it was I facing a disciplinary hearing at the Ministry of Magic.

This thought continued to unsettle me for the rest of the day, even after I had long since stopped being pressed beneath Sirius body. Who was I? I loved school. I loved learning more than I loved breathing for goodness sakes. I wasn't sure I liked the effect Sirius was having on me anymore. But as soon as that thought entered my head all I could see was his face, his dishevelled but somehow graceful hair, his piercing grey eyes staring down into mine and I could feel him against me, his kisses everywhere and I knew that that wasn't true either, and I was so confused, I wasn't sure if anything I thought anymore was right. What I was doing with Sirius wasn't right after all. Was it?

But is it right to live your life and never feel as if your very being was aflame with passion, and that you were going to be consumed by it, to feel as if you didn't kiss someone you would die, if they didn't touch you one more time you could no longer breathe?

**Perhaps a flare for the dramatic comes with being a teenager. But even as I think that now, I realise I feel exactly the same way now as I did then, but now I have the courage to realise what is that I am feeling. I was desperately in love with Sirius Black. I am desperately in love with Sirius Black. **


	15. It's cold in hell

I had spent five weeks having an affair with Sirius over the summer. For most people that's nothing. A few dates. But when you both spend 24 hours a day in the same house it's quite different. By the time I was on the Hogwarts express and I finally realised that I didn't know when I would next see Sirius, I had to leave the prefects meeting and find the nearest bathroom, where I promptly retched until my throat burned, with acid and with a choked sense of panic that made my heart feel like lead, and I felt myself crying, howling over the toilet basin and collapsing onto the floor. I spent ten minutes like this until I became myself again, and realised that I would be missed, that I needed to get back to the carriage and fulfil my duties as prefect. I felt quite numb as I slid the door open, my face clean of tears and coolly lied that there had been a first year crying in the toilets. I felt like a first year. Confused and frightened about going to Hogwarts.

I felt my eyes prickling as I wandered the corridors, patrolling, my mind back in London, remembering the way Sirius' kisses had burned me on our last night, and I felt as if he was trying to burrow a way into me with his brutal and yet strangely tender kisses, so that we could never be torn apart. I could still feel the way he clung on to me as if I might disappear, his strong arms holding me to him till I could barely breath, his mouth at my ear, whispering my name over and over again, the way he had called me his Hermione when he thought I had been asleep, when how could I sleep, knowing I was to be wrenched away tomorrow morning, and my eyes had prickled and I could no longer pretend to be asleep as I began to weep, and I was buried into Sirius chest, kissing him everywhere I could and we were making love again, and it was strange, it was slower but filled with an all consuming desperation that made my heart race so fast I was sure it would explode.

I'm sitting with Harry and the others in our compartment, and when he mentions 'Snuffles' I feel sure it will be written all over my face. I know I look like a dear in headlights, I must, he must be able to see. See the way his Godfather had growled my name and his fingers had held onto me so tightly there were little bruises there today, see the way I had clung to him, my nails digging into his back, hear the way I had gasped at the way he touched me, see how when I told Sirius that I wished I wasn't leaving, he kissed me so hard I felt sure I would be crushed, but that I wanted to be crushed, and most of all I wanted him, I wanted this to continue. I needed it to.

But of course he didn't, and when Ginny asked me if I was alright later on, I told her I must just have a stomach bug, and then I felt worse for lying and the fact that I knew she probably knows that's what I'm doing, lying, and I feel guilty all over again.

As I crawl into bed that night, exhausted with forcing back tears and screams, I feel the disappointment crushing down on me, that there is no chance Sirius will come to me tonight. I will defiantly be alone, and there will be no stolen moments, tomorrow, or the next day.

And I wonder, not for the first time, if it is worth this pain, that I feel sure I will not be able to stand, this affair with Sirius.

But then I remember the way he had touched me that first day in the library, when I had never felt anything like that before in my life, the way the white fire had ripped through my veins and my heart had thumped so fast I thought I was having a heart attack, and I know that it is worth it.

After all, how do you fully appreciate bliss when you haven't known hell?


	16. Madness

A.N.: Meant to say at the beginning of the last chapter, thank you so much for the reviews : D. Pesky flash-forward warning.

Perhaps I should have been patient. Not turned my back on doing things the right way because they did not yield the results I desired soon enough. But I was not patient. The war was over and I needed him. Like my enthusiasm and love for Ron had died along with Voldemort and the end of the war, so had my patience. I was sick of waiting and working and researching in the right places. I wanted him. I needed him. Now. I could not wait the decades it might take to find a responsible and good way to bring Sirius back. I needed an immediate solution, before I had driven myself so mad that I would be incapable of performing the necessary magic.

And that it why I am here now, pouring over some of the most darkest and foulest books I have ever had the misfortune to touch, and I feel dirty every night as I fall in to bed, or curl up on one of the comfier sofas. I cannot shake the feeling that what I am doing is inherently wrong, and deeply selfish. And not me. I am not Hermione Granger anymore. I am a woman so demented with love for her dead lover that she is prepared to invoke the most dark and ancient magic necessary to bring him back, as expediently as possible. I do not look like me anymore. Harry is worried. I can see it in his eyes as he looks at me. Whenever we set a date to meet, he always suggests we go out for a meal, and I know he thinks I am wasting away.

I feel desperately guilty for worrying him. For disappointing him. He is full of energy and happiness. Life is full of infinite possibilities for him now. Voldemort is gone. He has Ginny. He can pursue any avenue or career he wishes. And he cannot possibly understand why I seem to sink further and further into depression with every day that passes since the war ended. It must seem terribly bizarre to him. I try my best to keep up appearances for his and everyone else's sakes.

But somehow, I don't think I am as good an actress as I was at Hogwarts. I can no longer find the motivation required. During my fifth year, I had the incentive of Sirius, of our affair continuing if we could keep it secret, and I had my friendship with Harry to protect, and Sirius'. And then we were at war, and if that isn't a distraction when you are the Wizarding World's only hope's best friend, I don't know what is.

But now, all I have are empty days. They should be peaceful. I should be happy. I could start a career in whatever field I could dream of. But I cannot. I work in the Department of Mysteries. On the veil. And I know I am making progress. I can feel it.


	17. Selfish

I feel as if Sirius' recklessness is seeping into me with each day that passes since I left Grimmauld Place. I know I shouldn't have written. But I was careful, and I couldn't do it anymore, I couldn't keep pretending I was fine, not without talking to him, not without a reason to carry on. I needed something. Then there was the tremor, the little voice inside me that I hated so, that would whisper to me in the middle of the night that he might not write back, maybe he was glad I was back at Hogwarts. Maybe he wouldn't be interested in me now that we weren't able to have sex. So many maybes were whizzing around my head that I needed something, anything from him. Something concrete.

I did not have to wait long. His letter found me alone in the girl's dormitories, and I shook so violently as I attempted to open it that I dropped it several times. Nervous excitement raced through me, it had been over a fortnight since I had left. Since he had grabbed me moments before we were due to leave and pulled me into a small room off the main hall and pressed me to his hard chest, frantically kissing me and saying my name, over and over and telling me he would miss me, and asking if I would forget him, telling me that I would and that I would, I would meet someone else. That I should do that. But that I would always be his, and all I could do was kiss him back and say never, and I'm crying again, and I feel as if my eyes with burn away to nothing if I cry much more.

He missed me. He thought perhaps I had forgotten him, and as I read it I could picture the sulky expression on his face, one that he would later tell me he had worn for the full two weeks, spending days holed up alone with Buckbeak, stamping about the room and the slumping down on the floor to glare daggers at the threadbare carpet. Picturing me at Hogwarts, being chased by young and free boys. I laughed at him. Perhaps I shouldn't have.

He told me that he couldn't sleep. He couldn't sleep for thinking about what we would be doing if I was back there with him. I couldn't help but feel how ridiculously risky he was being, speaking to me in such an obvious and intimate way. He was reckless, but not for the first time I was selfishly glad that he was, and the euphoria of speaking to him, of knowing he missed me, pushed the thoughts of what would happen if he was caught, that we had more chance of continuing our affair if we were more careful, were pushed from my mind, and all I could do was grin, and then cry as I crawled again into my empty bed, thinking of him doing the same, and wondering how long it would be until I felt his warm body against mine in the depths of the night, his lips wandering about my neck, his low whispers in my ear. And then I was crying, and getting up, and writing him a reply, telling him I needed him. That I didn't think I could stand it, that it hurt so much and I was crying every day. And in my grief addled mind, I sent it, not thinking about the consequences of throwing a readymade excuse to Sirius to escape his prison at Grimmauld Place, not thinking that I was practically throwing him at the Dementors, that it was undoubtedly the most selfish thing I had ever done.

All I could think was that I needed him so badly, that I couldn't stand the thought that I didn't know when I would next feel his arms surrounding me, and that feeling of utter hopelessness drove me to sending that letter, and that it wasn't until the morning when I awoke after I had cried myself to sleep and slept dreamlessly, exhausted from my breakdown, that I realised what a terrible thing I had done.

I felt sick again, but for quite a different reason. I felt sick because I might see Sirius, but it could be the last time I ever see him. Panic swelled in me at an alarming rate, and I sprinted up to the Owlry, unable to face Ron or Harry, and tore at the parchment so violently with my quill that I had to start anew, telling Sirius that I was okay now, and not to worry, and not to do anything rash.

But of course, if there is one thing that Sirius Black specialises in, it is recklessness.


	18. A word to the wise

A.N.: I'm so sorry for the much longer than usual gap between updates. It was my birthday on Saturday and I had a surprise party which was amazing  but I then had to spend several days searching for my liver, which wisely abandoned me :P. Hopefully I will be able to get another chapter up tonight.

The sickness that I felt at the thought of Sirius finding his way to me, risking capture, risking everything, is washed away when he is wrapping me in his arms, burying his face in my hair and memorizing the smell, clinging to me as though I might vanish and I to him, and we are kissing, and it's like a war, and the winner gets to burrow into the loser and never be separated again, but then of course we both win and he is pressing me to the cave wall, and I am struck by the memory of when I last saw him here, how little time has really passed but how dramatically things have changed.

I could not have imagined that in less than a year I would be kissing Harry's Godfather, gasping his name as he left dangerously obvious marks all over my neck, sucking and biting his way down and pulling my top up and over my head. I murmur his name against his neck as he kisses my shoulder, my lips, my ear, my throat. I tangle my hands in his hair and try desperately to hold on to the memory of the texture, the way he feels, so I can bottle it up and feast on it later.

I do not ask him how he got here. How he sneaked out of Grimmauld Place. I do not admonish him as perhaps I should. For once I do not want to be the sensible one, and that is not what Sirius needs, another one to add to the dozen telling him to stay put, to be responsible, that it's not safe. To placate my guilt I tell myself that it is the lesser of two evils, him being here with me, unbuttoning our clothes, his hot hands everywhere at once. That he could be out, driven mad by being locked up inside, hunting death eaters, unable to stand the monotony any longer. I tell myself I am giving him a safer option. I tell myself that I am not selfish. I ignore the voice in my head telling me that if I cared for him I would have been more careful about sending letters enticing him out of the safety of Grimmauld Place. I ignore the flashes that stray into my mind of what Harry's betrayed face would look like should Sirius be captured and he discover why. I concentrate on Sirius and soon all I can see is his face, his shoulders, his lips, his crooked smile, his hair in his eyes, his beautiful grey eyes.

For the first time, I feel glad that I sent that letter, that I have been so reckless. I need him and he is here. And that proves to me, in a shining moment of realization, that there is more to this than just sex, that I do not just miss the feel of Sirius body pressing into mine in the middle of the night, I miss him, and he misses me too, and he's telling me now as he holds me to him, and then we are making love, and I cry into his hair and he is stroking my face, and he kisses me, much softer than the urgent kisses of before, and he stares at me, his eyes alight and fierce.

I feel as if I never want to feel anything else, never want to feel anyone else's hands on my body. I also feel as if I am no longer just acting like someone else, I am someone else. This is not the Hermione that sat in this cave a few short months ago watching Sirius devour a chicken leg, It is a new and slightly deranged with obsession Hermione that is now I, and it feels strange. I struggle to remember how I used to feel about Sirius. How I would have thought before.

We don't sleep afterwards, we lie wrapped in conjured blankets, wrapped in each other, and I babble and he rants, and he asks me if I like anyone at Hogwarts, and I can't help but laugh, foolish as I am, and ask him why I would want silly boys when I have him, and he answers, perhaps wisely, because they are there. Because they are free.


	19. Mischief, Managed

A.N.: Flash-forward time again folks.

I have a manic feeling of hysteria as I make my 13th attempt. Such an unlucky number. Will it be mine? My attempts have taken me months, and I have nearly lost my job at the department at which I so desperately need to be. Access to the veil is imperative, and to lose my position here would be to lose any chance of bringing Sirius back without risking breaking into the Ministry.

It is the dead of night, and I am supposedly doing some over time on my veil research. There is not a soul in this area of the Ministry, and I am confident I will not be disturbed. I begin to picture Harry's ecstatic face should I succeed, but I quickly berate myself. I am tempting fate. Then I feel ridiculous. I do not believe in such nonsense. But I have found myself believing in a lot of things I would never have considered before, to keep myself sane, to give me hope, a lifeline. A purpose.

I believe that I can return Sirius from behind the veil. And the electric feel of the air around me convinces me that tonight I will succeed. I must. I have to. I am falling apart and people are starting to notice, and I am not sure how long I will hold onto my post here. People think I am ill. My boss has suggested I take some time off and perhaps visit St Mungo's for a health check. I am thin and ghostly pale. Dark shadows have taken up a permanent residence under my eyes, which themselves look exhausted. They are haunted by Sirius, and I sometimes think that if someone were to look close enough they would see him there, like a ghost, an echo, they would see his face, and they would understand why I am like this.

But of course, they do not, and they do not understand what is wrong with me, they think perhaps that it is post traumatic stress starting to set in from the war. But they do not understand that it is not the deaths of those lost in the war that are haunting my every waking moment. It is the death of Sirius Black.

I wonder if Harry will think anything of why I have bought Sirius back, or whether he will blindly accept it as a gift to him, that I cared platonically for him and wanted him back for Harry's sake. Of course he will. He never realise when we were having an affair under his nose. Sometimes in the next room. He did not notice me stealing his invisibility cloak to see Sirius in that cave. He does not see that when he mentions Sirius my heart stops beating for a few seconds, and all I can see his Sirius and I dancing at Christmas, his laughing face, his dancing eyes.

I awake surrounded by broken glass, paper, spilt potions and such. It is as though a hurricane has blown through the chamber, and knocked me over along with everything else. The table I was using is in pieces. I gasp as I sit up. This has never happened before. Something has happened. This is supposed to happen. A colossal wind as the soul finds its way back to corporeal being. And now I wait. And hope. I hope that it is my Sirius that comes back. Our Sirius. I hope that he is the same, that I have performed the spells correctly, that being a know-it-all has finally reaped its most amazing reward.

I hope that he still wants me.


	20. Despair

A.N.: Last chapter of suspense! Sirius is either back or not back next chapter. Thankyou very much for the reviews :) :) Oh and it's a flash-forward/present time for the story type chapter.

I pace the halls of Grimmauld Place, deranged with all consuming impatience. Impatience to know if it really has worked, if I have succeeded, if Sirius is back, if he is okay, if he is still the Sirius I remember. Impatience to know if he still wants me, if is he happy to be back. Of course he is I scold myself. It's Sirius. And now he can be free, free in a world where he will not have devote his time to hunting for death eaters and worrying if Harry will still be alive tomorrow. He will be free in a world free of Voldemort, and he will be happy and then finally so will I be.

But of course, after a year in captivity here and 16 years of desperately unhappy childhood, why would he return here? This would of course be the last place he would want to come back to, and in all probability he would never set foot inside these dark walls again.

I rush around the house, throwing things haphazardly into my trunk, clipping my hair at the back of my head, thick wisps immediately freeing themselves, flying into my eyes as I race around, until I am packed and in my coat and I don't fully realise where I am going until I am there, and breathing in the cold fresh air, sprinting up my front path, my trunk levitating in behind me, and I am pacing again.

I don't know why I think Sirius would find me here. It is completely illogical. But I cannot go to Harry and Ginny's, he would think me mad. Maybe he wouldn't. But selfishly, I wanted to be the first that Sirius saw. I had waited so long, I had worked so hard, and I alone had had to live with the fact that I knew Sirius could be brought back, and I alone had kept researching, endlessly, when everyone else had eventually accepted his death.

But perhaps they would be proved right. Perhaps he was dead, and there was nothing that could be done, that this was all rumour and legend and I was deluded by my own longing, that Sirius really isn't coming back and everyone else is right.

I'm exhausted. In every sense of the word. My eyes burn and my limbs ache, and I finally allow myself to collapse onto my sofa. I try to keep my eyes wide, terrified I will miss something, but as I am wondering on places I should perhaps look for him, I am asleep, a deeper sleep than I have had since we won the war.

But then I am dreaming, and tossing and turning, struggling against the cushions around me, and I can see Sirius, but he is angry and crying and pushing me, pushing me against the wall and it is not in lust, he is not kissing me and telling me he loves me, as I have dreamed of for so many years, hundreds it feels, he is shouting at me, demanding an explanation, one that I can't seem to voice when he looks at me like that. Betrayed, distraught, furious.

I don't understand, but I know that I have done something terrible, and my stomach twists horribly as I search for what it can be. But then he is yelling again, and I am covering my ears against the things he is saying, fear is clutching at me and I am praying that this isn't happening; it is too hideous to even contemplate.

"WHY? Why have you done this to me? I thought you loved me! But you've taken me away, you selfish heartless bitch, how could you do this? Little know it all, always got to show off, prove that you could do it. Is that it Hermione? You needed to prove you could do it? Was I your little project? Kept you busy after the war did I?"

Sirius face contorts in rage as he spits words at me, and they rip through me like a knife, but I can't explain, I need to, he has to know I love him, but all I can do is gasp, clutching at the wall behind me in horror as this Sirius I don't recognise moves towards me menacingly, and finally, finally I know what it is truly like to be frightened of him, to be terrified, to really experience the horror of him unhinged, and he is against me know, holding me so tight that it is agony, and every twist I make to try and get away from him causes his fingers to pinch at my skin horribly, and he is shouting again, terrible things that I wish I could not hear.

"Are you proud of yourself Hermione? Will you write a paper? Won't you be happy, standing in the atrium at the ministry, going to receive your Order of Merlin, first class? Well I'm not proud Hermione, and I'm not fucking happy. Fifteen years I've waited to see James and Lily's faces again. Fifteen years I've had to spend without my best friend, and then I'd got him, I'd got James, and then Remus and Tonks, and now they're all gone, and I'm stuck here, with you and I hate-"

I gasp, thrashing back to consciousness, and I cry, heaving great gasping sobs into the sofa cushions, clawing at my arms, at my belly, at my hands, and suddenly my unwavering determination that has kept me alive for so long, falters, and I feel as if I am falling into a great abyss of despair, one that I have no inclination to return from.


	21. The Return

A.N.

I am awake, violently awake with my heart hammering in my ears, and I feel as if my pulse will rock me off the bed and to the floor if it pumps any faster. Alertness is suddenly mine as fear washes over me at the sounds floating into my bedroom. Crashing into my bedroom. I strain to decipher them, my fingers searching wildly for my wand.

Surely my wards have not been broken? Had I become sloppy in my desperation over Sirius? I felt as if I had been waiting years since my last attempt. An attempt I was so sure had been successful. Maybe...Maybe it could be...But then what if I had become sloppy, and it was not a welcome presence in my home. I wasn't entirely sure why I waited here, now, in my cottage in Hogsmeade, but I could not convince myself, however much I wanted to stay and absorb every last molecule of Sirius out of his old bedroom, that he would return there. If he returned at all. Perhaps he had. Please Merlin. Please.

I feel my stomach lurch as my hand does a fifth swoop of my bedside table, as I realise that I have left my wand on top of a pile of books I can clearly picture, precariously balanced on a small table in my living room. I feel nausea wash over me as I hear what heavy footsteps, a man's footsteps, making their way closer. What a fool I had been. What if I were to die, murdered by a loyal death eater still on the run, and Sirius were to return, and I missed him, because I had become careless, sloppy...arrogant. Arrogant in peace, thinking that my only concern was to awaken Sirius from the dead, and forgetting that just because the war was over, did not mean that there was no danger, especially for someone linked so implicitly with Harry Potter.

My breathing is now so shallow I am sure I will faint, and then there is a silhouette in my doorway.

I am up and out of bed so fast, standing, moving forwards, in seconds, that normally it would make my head spin, but now I'm not breathing, and I am certain I will never need to again.

Sirius.

He moves towards me, and is an inch away from me before I can blink, although that is something I am quite sure I will never want to do again. I am torn between a million actions, crying, screaming, kissing him, gasping for breath, clawing my way inside him so that I can never be parted from him again. But Instead I find myself rooted to the spot.

But then his lips crash down violently on mine, and suddenly I can move again, and I throw myself around him, at him, to him, and as he's pressing himself so hard into me that I stagger backwards several steps even as I am crushed to him, I wonder if this is it, this is what insanity is like. I wonder if this is a figment of my desperate imagination, that I have finally driven myself over the edge. But I cannot bring myself to be as concerned as I should be, and I find myself grateful. I would sooner be mad, and get to feel his body pressed against mine, hear his breathing hot in my ear, his rough skin against my cheek, than be sane and without him.

But then I can see him, I can see him in the moonlight streaming in through a crack in my curtains, and he has to be real. He has to be. He's here, and I'm crying, an ocean washing down in between our faces as he kisses me, Sirius, my Sirius, here, finally, and I cling to him so hard that my nails are digging into his skin, but he doesn't seem to care, he's bruising my arms too, and I am glad, glad I will have some tangible proof that this did happen, he was here. He is here. Back. With me.

And then he is pushing me down onto the bed, or we are falling together, I'm not quite sure, but his lips are barely gone from mine before they are back, and then everywhere, and his hands are ripping at my clothes, and then he speaks finally as his teeth graze the skin of my breasts, his eyes blazing at me through the semi darkness, and he tells me I'm his. And then he's kissing me again, gasping as I push myself up into him, my hips rocking against him, my tongue brushing sharply against his, and he's asking me how, and how long, and where's Harry, and that he wished he'd told me something, everything, anything, that I was his, wasn't I? And I'm promising that I am as I undo his belt buckle, and the euphoria racing through my body like wild horses is making me faintly hysterical and I am crying again, and I'm touching his face, trying to convince myself that he is here, that I'm not mad. Please. Please Merlin let me not be mad. Let him be real.

And If I'm mad... please don't let me get better.


	22. Polar

A.N. I'm so sorry for the uncharacteristically long gap between updates. I had a set structure for the next ten chapters, but then I started questioning whether I should end the story here and leave Hermione's sanity dubious, and then the usual excuses got in the way, work (or lack thereof and therefore job hunting) housework, family, dogs etc... Anyhow, I'm very sorry for keeping you waiting with no explanation.

Sirius is against me, me, Sirius, my Sirius, and sunshine is pouring in through the window and it could be gleam from heavens gates, I was with Sirius, I wasn't mad, it wasn't a dream, I had proof, the simplistic truth of fairytales, that if it was still there in the morning it was real. Real.

Real. A smile sweeps across my face, so wide it seems to stretch into my hair, so wide it hurts but it didn't because I haven't felt this happy since I was kissing Sirius in Grimmauld Place at Christmas. I have never been this happy. There is a saying that you have to know the true lows to truly experience the highs, and I can finally see the wisdom in that now. I have never been this happy. I hope I never am again.

I grasp at Sirius hair, letting it slide through my fingers like thick silk, and a sigh is tumbling through my lips, and his eyes are fluttering, Sirius' eyes, that I feared I would never get to see again but prayed so feverishly that I would.

Sirius eyes are open and focusing on me, and I feel as if they are pouring into me, liquid silver into my veins and he kissing me, forcefully at first, rolling me onto my back, but then it's gentler, and he's staring at me in between kisses, trailing his hands up and down my sides, and then he wants to know everything, everything that has happened, and then I see it as if Harry has just walked across his face, the panic and fear and desperation, and then mania and I reach out and place my hands on either side of his face and I'm telling him the magic words, Harry's okay.

And then he's kissing me again and laughing, and I'm breathing out bits of the story to him between kisses, and he's so happy, and he's so much younger it seems, an enormous weight lifted from his shoulders. A happy ending of sorts. And it is all too perfect, as of course it always is when a dirty shadowy secret is lurking in the background, ready to snatch happiness away, itching, waiting, and begging for release. I can feel it, a lump in my throat, my heart, my stomach. It's made of lead but yet it can squirm, push at my insides, scream. Force guilt upon me like a tidal wave.

Ron.

I am not a psychologist. But Sirius has been in purgatory. Our relationship suspended in mid air, out of reach for a time. I have cheated on him. You can argue that he had died for all intents and purposes, that of course I should have moved on, of course I needed comfort, it was only natural, of we were all in the midst of a war we had no means of knowing we would win. When it would end. If it would end. In situations like that people live in the moment, you could die tomorrow after all. How could you possibly blame me? But of course you would. And he would. I would. He will.

It won't matter that it didn't compare, could never compare to the touches and kisses Sirius laid upon in me the middle of the night. It wouldn't matter that I couldn't help but think of him, to make comparisons, to cry myself to sleep at night. That I had cried when he kissed me for the first time, like Cho had done to Harry. It wouldn't matter that for every second that he was gone I was in love with him, I thought of him, I longed with him until I felt sure my heart would burst and scream to everyone how angry I was, how much I hated them for keeping me here, that I wanted to join him, that I dreamt every night of flinging myself through the veil after him, that I resented everyone and everything.

I had cheated on him. I had betrayed him when I had promised that I never could. That would be all that mattered. And as I watch Sirius' eyes dance at the thought of Harry being with Ginny, James and Lily reborn, I feel cold panic swoop through me. And indecision.

To lie in desperation to cling onto Sirius, to leave our relationship untainted by his knowing, only to taint it with more lies. Or to tell him the truth and risk losing him when I have spent so many years alone and seeking his return.

I know what I would do if I thought it was infallible.


	23. Brand

I see it pour over his face like ice water. A thousand icicles piercing his skin, his heart, his eyes. He stares at me, not comprehending, but he is because I can see the pain choking him like a chain around his neck. I want to rip it away, to bury it, but I can't, it's too late.

A rush of explanations and apologises and pleading sobs escape me in a tumble, an avalanche that I can't stop. I have to tell him everything, how I hated it, how I loved him all along, how I'd do anything to take it back, that it was the war, and immediately apologising for making excuses, there were no excuses.

I have no idea how I have arrived here so quickly. There is a small voice in the back of my head, asking, quite bewildered, what just happened. This was not the plan.

But I knew if I left it one more second that I would never tell him, that I would do anything, purge memories, lie till I was blue all over, that I wouldn't be able to do it if I had one more moment of bliss, that the scale between right and happiness would be tipped to far too happiness. Somehow my conscience had broken through and stepped in, and I was furious, confused, stunned as to how it happened. It was as if I had watched the good side of me step forth and take charge for a few moments, and then deserted me to deal with the consequences, to somehow right the mess my other self had created.

I'm clinging to him, staring up at him, pleading, begging, all dignity and pride vanished from me the moment I saw him... I saw that come to his face. Broken-ness. I had done that. I had shattered his happiness so completely and so totally without warning, that the rage I had expected did not come. It was as if the fiery monster I had expected to spring forth had fluttered out, extinguished by surprise. And in its place was a broken Sirius, crumpled and staring at me disbelievingly.

Sirius continued to stare at me in silence, even as I told him it was only a handful of kisses, that it meant nothing, and then it was as if a lighter had been chucked onto the kerosene inside of him that was idling, and he was furious, and rushing at me, his hand in the air and I felt myself freeze, my body, my lungs, my heart. My eyes transfixed on his open palm above me, the tenseness of waiting, and then cringing away, my eyes screwed up in preparation for a blow that never came.

Sirius yanked his hand away, shoving it as a fist into the wall beside me. Then his palms were shoving into the wall, banging down over and over and then tears screeching down his face, and then his eyes were on me, staring at me, boaring into me, searching for an answer to a question he hadn't asked me.

"You promised. You said... After Victor. After the letter, you said. You said Hermione! You promised you could never do this. You would never do this. I fucking love you Hermione. And you... you've been fucking Ron Weasley? He treated you like shit for Merlin's sake. I... I just can't..."

"I didn't... I never... It was just a hand full of kisses, I swear, I could never have... I've only ever... You Sirius! It was always you! You weren't there, you have no idea-"

"NO IDEA? NO IDEA HERMIONE? WHAT DO YOU THINK HAPPENED THE FIRST TIME AROUND? VOLDEMORT DIDN'T WANDER DOWN THE STREET HANDING OUT FUCKING PUPPIES YOU KNOW!"

And then the air is knocked out of me, and my shoulder blades are digging into the wall behind me, because Sirius is inexplicably kissing me, brutally, biting my lower lip, savaging my mouth, holding me to the wall with bruising fingers and I'm gasping, but I can't struggle, I won't, I can't, not with the knowlage that he might never kiss me again in my mind. And then he's asking me what it was like, whether he was any good, whether I liked it, whether I liked little boys kissing me better, whether he told me I was pretty, whether Harry knew, and I heard his voice catch over the subject of Harry's approval, but I could do nothing but shake my head as best I could with his face so close to mine, my eyes staring widely into his.

"No. I love you. I hated it. I want you. Please. Please." He shushes me as I continue to plead, to beg, he kisses me, over and over again, as if trying to erase all the kisses Ron gave to me, to burn them from me, to brand his over the top, to reclaim me. I hope it works. Please Merlin let it work.


	24. Me

It is like being handed sanity pills. Perhaps I have, perhaps I have been poisoned. Or made better, depending on your point of view. Because as I stare at Sirius now, I know that I love him.

I don't love him because he was the first man to have me, to possess me and make me forget my own name, to make me forget my own life, my purpose, my friends, my best friends, to make me forget everything, everything except for him.

I love him, because I love him, his soul, his smell, his molten silver eyes, his anger, his passion, his bravery, his sheer pure and unadulterated recklessness, the delight with which he lept down those ministry steps the last time I ever saw him alive, the freedom in every bounce of stride, the glee, the bliss, even in dying, laughing.

And I so very nearly jepordised it, hell, I practically destroyed it before my very eyes, but he loves me, I knew that as his rythem began to calm, as he stopped slamming into me as if it might be the very last time, as if it were revenge, and more like he had missed me, like he wanted me, so I could feel his eyes on mine, stunned, amazed, delighted, with only the merest tinge of desperation.

And as I hear us planning telling Harry, our limbs entwined, his silver eyes dancing as he watches me, my hands waving about, the excited high pitched note in my voice, I can feel myself becoming something, something I should have been years ago. Something Sirius knows I should have been. Something he should have been, but never had the chance.

The chance that was snatched from him, ripped from him, but that I had without thinking about, hat I pushed aside, without realising, without relishing and treasuring it, the opportunity to grow up, to think things through, to see things from both sides and think of the best, not the most comfortable, the most enjoyable, the easiest.

And I choose him. I choose Sirius. I don't care what it costs me. I don't care. I will make a new life if I have to. Because I know now that some things are worth it. And he is worth it. It will be worth it. Because I am his. But I am Hermione Granger either way, always, finally, and I will never not be again. I am fixed.


End file.
